Tamera Cook's Reviews > A Place For Wolves

I have to be absolutely fucking honest here, everybody. I’ve never been so disgusted in my life.

I’m going to give you a bit of a history lesson. It is going to be extremely summarized, because I don’t have the space to give you all the information in great detail. If you want to know more—and you should—I would encourage you to do some research yourself.

In the 90s, Yugoslavia broke apart into various different nation states. One of the states that wanted independence was Kosovo. Right beneath Kosovo is Albania, and 90% of people living in Kosovo were ethnically Albanian. Most of these Albanians were also Muslim. Above Kosovo is Serbia, which was largely Orthodox Christians, and Serbia did not want Kosovo to seek independence.

In the 1996, a Kosovan rebel group called the Kosovan Liberation Army formed to fight against their oppression and subjugation, with the goal of seeking independence. They procured weapons, and fought the police and the government for independence in an uprising. Serbian police began to fight back, and started committing atrocities against Albanians, forcing many refugees to flee. Other countries, including the USA, demanded a ceasefire. Following this, the KLA regrouped, and the Yugoslav and Serbian forces responded by ethnically cleansing Albanians from Kosovo. By committing Genocide, essentially. Massacring entire villages, forcing 90% of Kosovo from their homes. Thousands and thousands of girls between the ages of 13 and 19 were raped.

Now, this is a real event, that happened in our very recent past. Not even two decades ago. Babies during the genocide would still be teenagers today. That is how recently it happened. While a surprising amount of Americans have never heard of this genocide, to people from the affected areas, it’s everything. It’s a tragedy that they continue to reel from.

Now, what’s the relevance here, you may ask? Well, a Place for Wolves is set during the Kosovan Genocide. It centers two, non-Muslim Americans, and largely focuses on their suffering, and their fear, whilst being caught in the chaos. There’s something so gross to me about centering our pain and experience in a real-life tragedy that really wasn’t about us. I would like to see this story written by someone who deeply understands it, who feels the pain of their friends and family, who actually was displaced, or threatened. But instead we get the story of privileged Westerners as they viewed the conflict. Which could have been handled well. But oh, it was not. We weren’t watching the suffering inflicted on the Albanian’s viewed through the MC’s eyes. We were watching the MC’s suffering. We were meant to care about the MCs, and screw the genocide victims, really. Which would be fine if this were a fantasy novel, but for fuck’s sake, this novel is set during a REAL LIFE GENOCIDE.

Honestly, reading this felt like the author wanted to set a book in a situation where he could put his MCs at risk and in danger, but he didn’t want to write fantasy, so he decided to set it during the Kosovan genocide. Why do I say this? Because this wasn’t a respectful exploration of a tragedy that really happened. It was all about the MCs, and how scared we are for them, and how much we hope they get out okay so they can return to America and be safe. And, oh yeah, the Kosovans who didn’t get murdered no longer have their family, friends, or homes, but *waves hand vaguely*.

And don’t even get me started on the well-educated Muslim man, Professor Beqiri, who turns out to be a coldblooded terrorist who’s only purpose seems to be to murder and torture and commit harm, even killing his own men. Why, exactly, did the author choose to make the main villain in this story an Albanian Muslim, when it was ALBANIAN MUSLIMS WHO WERE ETHNICALLY CLEANSED? Whatever happened to being aware of what point you’re making with your characters? Another reviewer mentioned that it was somewhat understandable that Professor Beqiri was portrayed as the villain, given that he kidnapped the MCs parents. But that is exactly why I think it was a terrible idea to center this story around fictional Americans. Because most of the readers reading this book will have no prior knowledge of this war, and this will be what they take away from the Genocide. And those who do have knowledge may very well have been affected by the war. Kids. Teenagers. Who already hear about how Muslims are terrorists in the modern world, having to read historical fiction about a tragedy that affected their own family, only to see they’re the evil terrorists once again. In what world is that okay? In what other Genocide would we agree that stories saying the victims were just as wrong should be published?

I am all for ownvoices LGBTQIA. And when I say that, I *mean* it. That’s why I requested this book faster than lightning. But there is a dark side to LGBTQIA books in the community. Specifically, LGBTQIA books that feature a romance between two cis-men. And that, as many of you know, is fetishization. Now I want to clarify – DEAR GOD, I DO NOT MEAN THIS AUTHOR FETISHIZED THIS GAY RELATIONSHIP. I have zero criticisms with the gay rep in this book—it was ownvoices and well done. It’s the reason I gave 2 stars instead of 1. However. I have a strong issue with the way that a lot of the reviewers are reacting to this book, and I have to be honest, a lot of it reeks of women fetishizing gay men. When I read through the positive reviews on here, the running theme seems to be “yeah the war was interesting to learn about and all, but BOYS CUDDLING”, “This was such a cute gay love story”, “soft boys” etc.

Attention, everybody. What the fuck are you talking about? People DIED IN REAL LIFE. LOTS of people. VERY RECENTLY. And the only important thing to you guys is the fetishization and patronization of gay men? Jesus H. Christ, are you listening to yourselves?

Maybe some of you don’t realize that this is based on something that actually happened. In real life. To people who would almost all still be alive today. I hope it’s that you just don’t realize. Because if you do, and you think this is ‘cute’ . . . that’s extremely disturbing.

I don’t know how to get it through to you just how horrifying and harmful this is. To see people calling this a ‘cute gay love story’. I just. Okay. If people were discussing a ‘cute gay love story’ about ‘boys cuddling’ set in the Holocaust while people were brutally murdered around them, would THAT make you cringe? Because this is similar, but this only happened 20 years ago.

Oh, and lets take that a step further. This book about American ‘boys cuddling’ is set during a genocide, where the moral of the story is “Hey, nothing is black and white, and a lot of those victims did awful things too, and maybe they sometimes had it coming”.

I am not even joking or exaggerating. And if you think I’m being dramatic, the author even acknowledges this in his authors note. He quite literally acknowledges that he painted the Albanians in a bad light to show that ‘not everything is black and white’. . . . ”in war, there are multiple sides to every story. All Albanians were not good. All Serbians were not bad. . . . Good people make bad choices. Bad people make good ones. And most people are somewhere in the middle…”

Are. You. SERIOUS? Hey, how about we DON’T try to make the point that not everything is black and white when we are writing a book about a LITERAL GENOCIDE THAT HAPPENED TWENTY YEARS AGO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Because of course it was gray in real life. But the first mainstream YA book that looks at this setting, AND it’s not written by a Muslim or someone from this geographical area, AND it centers Americans? This is definitely a little too early to be looking at all the ways the genocide victims were evil. I do acknowledge that the KLA did commit violent acts. However, given the enormous death toll for ethnic Albanians, and the fact that the ethnic cleansing was entirely targeted towards Albanians, I think it is wholly irresponsible to have the story’s main villain be an ethnic Albanian.

Look. I’m not going to tell you what you should or shouldn’t read. I’m not one of those people. And hey, lots of people clearly did enjoy this book. But if you think that this is fine, but you would condemn another book that villanized real-life victims of a genocide, or centered Americans in a recent real life tragedy that occurred to a largely Muslim population, or a book that featured multiple cold-blooded Muslim terrorists who’s only goal is to kill and torture and who can’t feel love or loyalty . . . then I just want you to ask yourself why that is.

Is it because this book is about a lesser-known Genocide? That maybe you just aren’t feeling that revulsion because you didn’t know much about what happened?

Is it subconscious Islamophobia? The same way so many ignore suffering happening in the Middle East today, because that’s just over there somewhere?

Is there another reason? Are you able to confidently justify supporting this book despite all of the above, despite the harm it can and will do to real people, real people who’s family and friends were slaughtered in the 90s? Real teens who will undoubtedly have lost uncles and aunts and grandparents, who will see that finally, a mainstream book is touching on what happened to their people, only to pick it up and find themselves painted as the villains?

Then okay. Do it. But please, don’t kid yourself. If you think this is okay, own it. Don’t just ignore what this book is because you wanted it to be something else.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the eARC in exchange of an honest review.